“Startups and Videos” Research Results

A few weeks earlier, we’ve created a short, anonymous, online research examining startups and their relation to animations and videos.

Almost 30 participants filled the form to the date of this post. The majority of them (~90%) came from the Hungarian Facebook group called “Startup Entrepreneurs” (“Startup vĂˇllalkozĂłk” in Hungarian).

Below we’re publishing the raw results with adding a comment or two. These comments represent our opinion as a creative studio with professionals with 10+ years of experience in the visual marketing, storytelling, animation and design.

The majority of the participants are 26+ years old, hopefully having at least 4 years of experience of working (either as an employee/freelancer and/or as an entrepreneur).

Most of them take part in one startup, meaning that single project should be a priority and a rather focused project.

Most of the projects are in the concepting and validation phase…

…mostly developing the project as a team, not as a lone warrior.

This is a picture of the mixed results of the participants’ occupation in the project. We see a bit of weakness in Sales, Marketing and Product Manager areas, compared to other areas.

17 startups out of 26 don’t have any videos…

…because the majority thinks that developing quality animations/videos needs money, attention (which is true) and that it’s early for them to invest in one.

On the other side, those who already have a video mostly have one or more videos in the form of an explainer and/or crowdfunding and/or private pitch/presentation video…

…and they are generally happy with it. Only 1 participant thought that their video wasn’t worth investing, although they admittedly haven’t invested much time and energy in it (which may be the exact reason it didn’t make them happy in the end).

92% of all participants plan to create a new video/animation in the next 1 year…

…and most of them would like to develop a public explainer video…

…which, for 50% of the participants will be mostly fairly important for the business, and for an another ~20%, it’ll be essential.

Explainer videos are generally tools of mass communication (and are great tools for it), and mass communication is important if not essential – if you plan to scale.

Those who responded to this question mentioned budget as the most important factor in deciding whether to create a video or not.

The majority will outsource the video production to a professional or a professional team, which we think is a wise choice for those who consider the video important.

And now some bad news for those who seek quality and a durable video piece to fulfill an important role in a business. For around or less than $500, it’s not likely you’ll have a deliberate and great video/animation.

The video development process requires a number of assets and professions and – as you already know – attention. If you think that you’ll receive a durable solution for around or less than $500, you’ll be disappointed.

And beware, viewers of all kinds generally know when they watch a low budget video: you can’t hide it. The story, the flow, the visuals, the narration speed, the music, the volume levels, the visual appearance, the speed of the motions, and all these and other little details can make or break a video. For $500, you’ll either have a low quality broken video and/or a very simple one. And by this I don’t mean ‘minimalistic in style’, I mean very simple. Also, low quality videos can actually DO harm instead of helping you and your viewer, as they are rarely clear in their message and they rarely capture and maintain attention (due to not so good visuals/animations). This can confuse your audience and in turn they will be happier to turn to someone else who is more clear and professional in both message and style.

Of course, you could try to outsource the production to a country where living costs are down, but experienced media professionals will always ask for their price, just like any other professionals. You can choose to go with a video professional and follow a template-based approach together, which can of course reduce the costs (introducing tons of compromises in return), but just like in the wordpress-world, searching for the right template, communication of the altering needs and getting to know the available options of a template takes time, so $500 would not take you too far on this road either, and at the same time, you’re destined not to stand out too much with it, as you followed a stock solution.

The bottom line is: if the video is important for your business, you should invest in it. I intentionally said “invest” instead of “spend”, as it’s not a business cost: a video should be an investment and one should measure the effect of it, and alter the video contents, messages if necessary – just like a website. We’ve took part in more than 100 video/animation projects, and constantly analyze video solutions and possibilities, so we think these conclusions are valid and are backed by experience.

Participants of this research generally have their focused startup project and we bet they have very high hopes for it, which is great and we wish luck with it! However, if they value their customers, they’ll know that they have to serve their needs not just with the product, but with its presentation/packaging too.